Mademoiselle de Nantes declares that she would have behaved very well in the coach, and that she is a nearer relation to you than the Duchesse de Nevers, and that it was very unfair not to take her with you this time.  In order to comfort her, the Duc du Maine has discovered an expedient which greatly amuses us, and never fails of its effect.  He tells her how absolutely necessary it is for her proper education that she should be placed in a convent, and then adds in a serious tone that if she had been taken to Fontevrault she would never have come back!

“Oh, if that is the case,” she answered, “why, I am not jealous of the Duchesse de Nevers.”

The day after your departure the Court took up its quarters at Saint Germain, where we shall probably remain for another week.  You know, madame, how fond his Majesty is of the Louis Treize Belvedere, and the telescope erected by this monarch,—­one of the best ever made hitherto.  As if by inspiration, the King turned this instrument to the left towards that distant bend which the Seine makes round the verge of the Chatou woods.  His Majesty, who observes every thing, noticed two bathers in the river, who apparently were trying to teach their much younger companion, a lad of fourteen or fifteen, to swim; doubtless, they had hurt him, for he got away from their grasp, and escaped to the river-bank, to reach his clothes and dress himself.  They tried to coax him back into the water, but he did not relish such treatment; by his gestures it was plain that he desired no further lessons.  Then the two bathers jumped out of the river, and as he was putting on his shirt, dragged him back into the water, and forcibly held him under till he was drowned.

When they had committed this crime, and their victim was murdered, they cast uneasy glances at either river-bank, and the heights of Saint Germain.  Believing that no one had knowledge of their deed, they put on their clothes, and with all a murderer’s glee depicted on their evil countenances, they walked along the bank in the direction of the castle.  The King instantly rode off in pursuit, accompanied by five or six musketeers; he got ahead of them, and soon turned back and met them.

“Messieurs,” said he to them, “when you went away you were three in number; what have you done with your comrade?” This question, asked in a firm voice, disconcerted them somewhat at first, but they soon replied that their companion wanted to have a swim in the river, and that they had left him higher up the stream near the corner of the forest, close to where his clothes and linen made a white spot on the bank.

On hearing this answer the King gave orders for them to be bound and brought back by the soldiery to the old chateau, where they were shut up in separate rooms.  His Majesty, filled with indignation, sent for the High Provost, and recounting to him what took place before his eyes, requested him to try the culprits there and then.  The Marquis, however, is always scrupulous to excess; he begged the King to reflect that at such a great distance, and viewed through a telescope, things might have seemed somewhat different from what they actually were, and that, instead of forcibly holding their companion under the water, perhaps the two bathers were endeavouring to bring him to the surface.